Army aviation leaders detail rapid transformation and Future Vertical Lift progress

All right, well, welcome back, everyone. I'm Jen Judson, land warfare reporter for Defense News

I'm here with an amazingly full panel, even though we are in a shutdown

Here I have Major General Claire Gill, Army Aviation Center of Excellence Commander

Brigadier General David Phillips, Army Program Executive Officer for Aviation. Actually, he's, I just skipped over it. Brigadier General Cain Baker, who has a new title

Aviation Future Capabilities Director, no longer the future vertical of CFT, and Colonel Jeffrey Poquette, Program Manager for Future Long-Range Assaults Aircraft

So the last time I saw all of you together was in May at the Army Aviation Summit in Nashville

and it was right after the Army rolled out their Army Transformation Initiative memo

Lots of big muscle movements there and a lot of surprising and I think not so surprising decisions

So at Quad A, you said that the aviation branch was changing the way it's been doing business

So highlight just top level some of the ways that business is changing for aviation for the Army

All right. First, thanks, Jen, for having us and hosting. Thanks to the panel here

And welcome, everybody, to AUSA. Jen just alluded to we weren't sure if we were going to pull this off

So, AUSA did a great service in helping get everybody here so that we could talk about

what's going on in the Army and, frankly, the nexus between what the Army is doing and

what industry is doing. There is a lot of change happening. I think you're going to hear some themes that we're going to talk about here that will

seed what you're going to hear the rest of this week in terms of what we're doing

So, you're going to hear a lot about acceleration, right? Acceleration, Ryan just covered just about everything I think I wanted to talk about

So great job there, Ryan. Acceleration doesn't necessarily just mean twice as far, twice as fast

Acceleration means how we're doing business. And so the Army leadership has been very aggressive in that regard

and industry is moving at pace with us. I saw General Sloser, and I was just talking to Ryan

I said, how are you doing? They said, they're busy. I said, that's a good answer. Like, you know, we are moving quickly to deliver capabilities to the warfighter

You're going to hear the term transformation over and over and over again. Jen just alluded to the fact that the Army rolled out its transformation initiative in the springtime

and that is fundamentally changing many things but many processes as well

And so acceleration and speed do count. That's part of it. And then lethality

Everything that we are thinking about is about how to deliver a more capable formation

a more capable soldier, and the results that we want. And specifically in aviation, you know, we're talking about changing how we do flight school

We're changing. We're a huge shift across all of the Army from manned to unmanned capability

It doesn't mean we're walking away from manned capability, as we're talking about with the MV-75

That's a huge program for us. So a lot of opportunity out there for us to think about how we're going to fight in this new environment of large-scale combat

All right. Anyone else like to add to that? You're taking notes, General Phillips

Okay. I did want to jump right into accelerating, and you talked a lot about going quicker on the FLORA MV75 program

It's quite ambitious. So can you talk about where you are? Since May, we talked about the fact that you were going a lot quicker

with building prototypes and then concurrently also trying to get production aircraft a little

quicker and testing as you go. There's a lot of risk in that. So talk about where you see some of

the greatest risk in going quicker now that you've had a little bit more time to evaluate

Yeah, happy to jump in there. And I won't steal all of Jeff Paquette's thunder. It's good to have

your PM here with you because that way when you run out of details to share, he can share the

details but what I would say is just the foundational elements that we started

the program with those enable the foundation and the acceleration so when

you think about the JMR program like Ryan talked about you think about the amount of open systems architecture and approach work that was done before even

before we started bending any kind of metal whatsoever or putting code to paper there's a lot of fundamental cornerstones in the program the JMR's program was

one most of was another and then as we look forward into that we looked at the

right to repair and we looked at digital engineering and operationalizing that and

so the team's been able to do that and I think what I would offer as I hand it

over to Jeff is that the scale that we need to do that at right the 300

suppliers at tier one level over a thousand suppliers at tier two and below

you have a lot of scale that you need to operate at for a program of this

magnitude this size so ensuring that the whole team is rowing together and up up

to speed together is something i think that's changed this summer i think this summer the entire

team has leaned forward keeping those same principles and the same building blocks there

and i think um the the team is doing some really great work thanks sir so one of the first things

we did when we got that um directive from army senior leaders is we went to bell and said what

what are the things that you need to accelerate so we sought input from the folks actually doing

in the work. And they provided that big long list, right? Hundreds of things. And we sat and we talked

about that at the executive level, not just Ryan and me, but the CEO, the PEO and other aviation

senior leaders. Most important was, okay, what can we take a little bit of risk in so that we can go

faster, but not get rid of all the goodness that we really, you know, consider to be the cornerstones

of the program. General Phillips meant the right to repair. That for us was a non-negotiable, and we

made sure the Secretary understood that. MOSA was a non-negotiable. But things like the artifacts that we need to receive

maybe we can defer receiving the artifacts. And because Ryan mentioned how integrated we are down there

predominantly in DFW, because my team is there, and when they come back and say, hey, we're comfortable

they're taking the right approach, they're going the right direction, they may not get it all written down and submitted and then reviewed

That's the kind of things that we can defer down the road. As far as details go, sir, yes, a lot has happened in the past four months

Thousands and thousands, over 3,000 drawings, engineering drawings released, over 90% engineering released, 5,000 purchase orders across a supply base of over 360 at this point

So that's real movement on the program because, as we know, Bell doesn't build this alone

There's probably a lot of the suppliers in this room right here. They're certainly here at this convention

and they're a critical part to the program because Bell's the design

They build the fuselage. They build a lot of the big structures, but a lot of the things that make this work are out there somewhere

small companies, big companies, some of you've heard, some that you haven't heard

And like Ryan said, I've been all over the country meeting with companies that make ball bearings

or that make castings and forgings or that make big tools the size of this room

that facilitate making this incredibly complex machine So we seen real movement on the program Of course it starts with money Can we get the money in place so that we can actually go faster Some of it is

bringing money to the left because we were going to do it later and now we're going to do it earlier

And you mentioned risk. We don't see this as taking an incredible amount of risk. When you

are building prototypes and then you go to test and you are also building production aircraft

we said, okay, what would the risks be? The risk would be that you would be building production aircraft

that then you find things wrong in test. And then we said, Bell, how can you make us feel comfortable

How can you make me feel comfortable that you're going to be building aircraft while you're in test

And we've come to some agreements at the executive level that say, look, here's the pricing we want to do

and here's what we need you to do once we build aircraft. If they're not where they need to be, what are you going to do to get them fielded

So we have all that in place, and that's how we burn down that risk

We don't see it as risky as in the past. Some programs have done developmental tests and operational tests at the same time

We're not doing that. Developmental test, production alongside, and then operational test when the right risk authority is comfortable putting that aircraft in the air with operators

Walk us through the timeline again, where you were headed prior to the directive to go quicker

and where you think you are going to land when it comes to delivering prototypes and actually fielding production

Can you say where that stands now that you've had some time to really take a look with Bell closely

Yeah, absolutely. So we were expecting our first prototype in sometime the mid-27 timeframe, mid-calendar year 27

Secretary said, can we get that back into the year 26? So we worked with Bell to say, what is it going to take to get our first prototype delivered

So we are now tracking to early fiscal year 27 in that calendar year of 26

you said in the how was the program originally structured it was to go do prototypes

then test them get all the data then make a production decision

now which is commonly referred to as milestone C for those of you who know our doctrine

what we've said is can we make an early production decision at the right

risk levels and with the right authorities earlier than milestone C so we've pulled that early production decision to the left

the Army's still got time to make it It is a decision, and it's not a foregone conclusion

That's important to understand. And we're going to take data that we've got from the test program

We've got to have a good CDR. We've got to make sure that the first prototype that delivers, can it fly, right

Is it more than just coming off the ground and down, or can it go do a traffic pattern

Can it transition its rotors and tilt them? Is the software pretty good

If all that happens, then the Army Acquisition Executive can make an early production decision

and say, I'm willing to accept the risk that they won't be perfect, but that they will be valuable to the operator

So that's what we're going to do. Early production decision, it's not a doctrinal term, but that's what we're calling it

and that's now a year in advance. So we're looking at the FY28 timeframe

and we've already started planning for that in terms of the POM

So that's really how we expect to deliver capability earlier. What that does is it delivers a company 18 months earlier, which is pretty significant

Moving 18 months earlier in an acquisition program is monumental. We're bringing a company earlier

They're the ones that go to operational test. We're going to bring a battalion of 24 aircraft 18 months earlier

And then even more importantly, we can get to a brigade 30 months earlier

So not only are we making an early production decision, but we're ramping up our production

and we believe that the maturity of the JMR program will translate to the maturity of the production systems

that it will take to build aircraft earlier and at a faster rate year over year

Okay. Just to ask a follow-up on the money side, you said that you do need to bring money to the left in order to do this

Have you been able to successfully obtain that, or is that something you're still working toward

No, we've had, yeah, no, just to very briefly answer that. The answer is yes

We've talked to the Army budgeteers. It was a hard thing for them to do, make no mistake

It's a lot of money. It's bringing, you know, billions of dollars to the left

It's, again, we're spending them earlier. It's not more. It's just, you know, time phasing it a little bit differently

So the Army said this is a priority. We want to produce these faster and field them faster

So we've talked to the G8 primarily, and they figured it out

And that was a hard job for them to do. They've done it. So we feel very good about our production money across the palm. Okay

In terms of preparing the force to receive these early, how are you accelerating things like preparing the training side of the house

or anything else that you have to keep in mind, you know, across the spectrum, the DOTML PF

when you think about this, it's not just, you know, building an aircraft, but it's going to have to go into formation

So how are you accelerating, you know, preparing that side of the house

So we're developing something called an ops development team. I'm literally looking at talent packets right now

These are folks that are going to form up. They'll be early on really looking at the doctrine and all the things that we think about in terms of how we build out the capability

Eventually, we're going to put them somewhere probably in Texas, right? So we'll partner with Bell to have folks both with them, but eventually where we're going to train as an organization

And this will probably happen over the next three to four years. And then that will eventually morph itself into a unit

and that unit become the first unit that will go back to Fort Campbell and field the capability

Okay. Yeah, I think there's also another aspect of that. So, you know, two weeks ago we stood up Transformation and Training Command

Inside of there, Jen mentioned the CFT is now the FCD, the Future Capabilities Development Team

which really my team, along with the seeded down at Rucker, will handle concepts, requirements, and experiments

Tied to that is another cell that's standing up, the Transformation Initiative Directorate

That team will look at really the DOTMO-PF aspect of this. They will focus hard on everything outside of the materials solution

The doctrine, how we're going to train this, that really exists across all the different

centers of excellence. What General Gill mentioned with the ODT, the TID, and then the FCD, those three teams

come together and it's really an accelerant to get flora out to the field quicker across all of our

formations i do want to jump in here real quick uh virtual prototypes last october i mentioned them

and how excited i was and what they were going to do for general gill and general baker and really

on the non-material side they have a material purpose as well those are those uh virtual

prototypes delivered uh last spring they're up and running we have one down at fort rucker and we

We have one at Redstone, and that device is there for General Gill to put his, you know

top performers and really experienced aviators to start using the developed doctrine and training Okay okay I want to shift a little bit and talk about the unmanned side of the house

You know, obviously the PAO Aviation has been accelerating fielding, you know, small UAS

launch effects efforts. There's a lot to talk about here, but recently you launched the UAS

marketplace. So talk a little bit about why you did that and what you're hoping to achieve

through this strategy? So really the past 18 to 24 months have been all about accelerating our UAS

capabilities to the field at echelon. So that's across platoons and companies, battalions, brigades

and as we look at our ways of doing business, we're always trying to make them better

What we found in a lot of those fieldings where we were getting a lot of direct feedback from the

field, straight back through our training teams, straight back to the vendors, and it was a great

opportunity to then, as we were fielding the next tranche of capability, to go ahead and upgrade it

What we weren't, though, capturing is really the demand signal from each individual unit and each

individual user that we really wanted to capture, and we really wanted to make sure that we were able

to not just have a linear competition process, but have more of an ongoing competitive process

So with that, we looked at a new way of doing business. Instead of the linear RFI to RFP to

source selection to procurement, we looked at a competitive process that we could maintain

throughout that year. And so that marketplace, if you were to look at any other marketplace, like pick either

an Amazon or a Walmart, not necessarily an eBay, but I would look at something like a

marketplace that we could have multiple capabilities in the space that we can then present that

to units, allow units to bring their resources or our program dollars, apply to that, and then field

faster. And so we saw that as an enabler because we knew the old linear process wasn't going to be

able to cut it when it came to this next couple years when our resources really exponentially grow

And we're going to have to field faster to those units and ensuring that we've got a repository for

all that good feedback and lesson learned. We wanted to have that as well. So multiple reasons

we have it, but really to get after fielding faster, capturing feedback from the field

like we were already doing, but doing it in a better, more efficient, streamlined way

I think it's also the tech is changing so rapidly that rather than buy into a program

and be beholden to that for 20 years, the marketplace is allowing us to iterate with

industry as developing capability comes online faster. And so a unit could buy something, and three years later, if there's a 2X capability that exists

they're not stuck with the old capability. The marketplace allows them to go in and buy whatever the newest capability is, if it applies to their mission

How is the PEO organizing UAS now? I mean, it's lots of changes in terms of UAS and also how you're buying it

So, you know, are program offices changing? How are you approaching the structure to kind of stay organized as you shift into this new way of acquiring UAS

and also just so many different platforms and capabilities that you're looking at

How are you approaching that now? Yeah, I really appreciate that question, Jen

So what I would offer is that we've looked at this growth, this scale from going to maybe three programs five years ago

to 15, 20 different capabilities, and we just see that growing exponentially

like we said before, what I'd offer is that our first step was to reinforce success

So really to look at those teams that were high-performing, that were already executing

the small UAS mission, they were already executing the launch effects mission. There's an uncrewed vehicle control software component

And then we also looked at the other folks we had on the team to be able to reinforce

that success that they were already having. So as we looked at folks that were coming off of the FARA program last year, we looked

for a good home for those folks. and they were some of our highest-performing teammates also

So being able to reinforce the success that PMUAS was already enabled

with the folks coming from the FARA team and with the rest of the PEO

when you talk about engineering resources, sustainment resources, fielding resources, we're really weighting the main efforts

And as we looked at PMUAS in the future, I think we're going to continue to look at

are they structured correctly? Are things like launched effects growing so quickly that they need their own structure

as well. So I think we're going to continue to look at that going forward to always kind of adapt and meet the Army's requirements. Okay. And in advance of that, you know, how are you looking

at developing the requirements side of the House, General Baker? I mean, you've got launch effects

you've got small UAS, you've got potential to, you know, fill the shadow gap somehow, or the gray

you know, how are you looking at gray eagle? There's just so much across the board in terms

of requirements and how you fill that. Could you highlight a little bit about how you're approaching

this big beast here. Yeah, I think we get enamored by just UAS

And so really bringing unmanned and manned together is where we have to move to for in our requirements aspect

because they're going to have to work together on the battlefield. And so as we look to NextGenC2, that capability to share data

extend sensing, and then bring in manned platforms to fight together. So all of our experimentation over the next upcoming year

is tied to optimizing that manned and unmanned fleet while also bringing in a fires element

the intel element aspect of that counter UAS. So how do you make this work in an ecosystem

For requirements overall, I would say our requirements are set in stone right now where we are with building capability

I think marketplace feeds into that as we continue to adapt it

But overall, our focus right now is How do you bring this ecosystem together

How do you share data? How do you fight as one system, be able to extend that on the battlefield for the ground commander

Okay. Just some specifics on the UAS front, too. Obviously, with the Army Transformation Initiative, there was a decision to retire Shadow

We knew that was coming, and a decision not to buy more Gray Eagle UAS, for instance

these larger platforms, runway-dependent, things like that. so where does it stand in terms of

requirements or how you're looking at filling those requirements and capabilities on the battlefield with those

transitions? Yeah, so all the way up from squad level up to core, we've got a set of requirement documents that

we've set. David's team and PMUS, if you've got them out at

platoon level, company level, battalion is next to fall on suit for FTS, I think where you're getting to, Jen, is we did the Brigade DR

And we competed at this year since last October. Data's team did a very thorough job of looking at the competitors out there

and who is ready to deliver. We have a good idea of what that looks like

Now, obviously, as money comes about, we will start putting that on contract

But for the Brigade level, what we really wanted was a capability

that we could select and place in the hands of soldiers within 90 to 100 days And critical to that piece was the ability to adapt that system We weren really just looking for a vehicle

We were looking for a system that had modular payloads on it, that it could extend range

and we could quickly adapt to that based off of the needs of the commander

You know, when you talk about the marketplace, one thing I think we overlook a lot is we look hard at our requirements

We look at systems, but every unit has a different mission set potentially

Either it's in the Pacific, either it's in Europe, or other places on the globe

So now they have the ability to go in and select a system that meets their needs

And what we wanted for the Brigade DR was their ability to pick the sensors that they wanted to off of it

be able to look at the ranges, the payloads, to be able to adapt it to their mission set

And so that's what the Brigade DR does. And I think as we move forward in FY26, you'll see that brigade-level system fielded, a couple of potential vendors for that

As that money frees up, we'll start filling that out to formations. Okay

Can I just jump in? So, you know, the president put out an executive order, I think it was in May, that talked about American drone dominance

and then the SECOR put out a subsequent memo about a month later about American military drone dominance

And in it, there were some very specific things, right? So the president told his cabinet to figure out how to integrate these capabilities both, you know, at home and abroad, right

So recently we got some authorization to fly our Group 4 capability in FAA airspace

It comes with some, you know, qualifications and requirements. But, you know, he told the Secretary of Transportation, the FAA director, the Secretary of War Now, you know

hey, you have 120 days to figure this out, so we're hitting the 120-day mark right now

And then in the SECWARS memo, he gave the Army some very specific things about what to field and when

and it's all going to happen in 26. And so there is, you know, I talked about acceleration, right

There's a sense of speed and urgency to get these capabilities out to units, you know

to have launched effects and UAS fielded in every division by 26

And so that's something we're working on pretty hard. I would just double down on that because of the clarity of guidance

the clarity of requirements. An acquisition approach that's accelerated, and really now we're looking for the resourcing to apply to it

In 26, our Army senior leaders have set in motion the resources to apply to all these efforts

So we really see that this last year has been about removing all these barriers, setting ourselves up to really accelerate into 2026, and we're there

Can you walk us through the pathway for launch effects? I mean, you're looking at various sizes, ranges, things like that

So, you know, how is that fleshing out, and what are these timelines for launch effects

you know, depending on what the range or size is? You know, General Gill, General Phillips, you know, the discussion point

The guidance has been very clear from Secretary of War all the way down

We just finished our very first launched effects special user demonstration out at JBLM with 1st Corps, 7th ID, and down with Tactic Unit

That was the base this year of putting launched effects in the hands of soldiers

We've done a lot of experimentation over the last couple years. It's really been experiment focused

This is the first time we've taken vendors and said, hey, we want to put a capability, give it to a soldier, and then let's test it in an environment

So we had three vendors that we brought out to JBLM. We put them in three different types of units

We put them in a ground infantry unit. We put it in a striker unit, and we put it in an aviation unit

And we gave them use cases, and there's about nine use cases right now. Those use cases were really tied to the effects that they wanted from launched effects

be able to sense, be able to jam, be able to destroy a capability

We placed it in the hands of soldiers, and for about three weeks they had hands-on training

all the way down to how to properly handle it, how to program it, how to launch it

and then we put it out in environments against emitters, real threat

We allow them to do that for about three weeks. And then the bigger piece was we involved a division staff so they could plan it, see the data flow

and how that effect would be on the battlefield. From those three vendors, we learned a ton

We just recently briefed Army senior leadership of what we think the fielding plan looks like for FY26

that meets the Secretary of War's task, which is to place in every division by the end of 26

And so that is starting to move out in the next 30 days. And on top of that, that's really in our short-range capability

We're also looking at a long-range capability, more focused at the theater level

inside of Indo-PACOM and USRAF that will happen also in FY26. So a lot of movement inside of launch effects over the next 12 months

I would just add that we have already made our first procurements on that effort

and that was actually just two weeks ago. So coming out of that special user demonstration that General Baker talked about, we made an initial assessment, did some really rigorous ysis to make sure that what we would buy would then move to the units fast as we could

And then those first two units that will be receiving those, I think then we'll just be waiting for the $26 to arrive and then we'll scale that up appropriately

How are you approaching scaling? I mean, you're going to have to move very fast

So do you have any concerns or what are the risks out there in terms of getting the scaling going at a pace that you actually, you know, you're setting out to meet your goals

Or, you know, this isn't easy to just mass produce a lot of these here in the U.S

I really appreciate that question. So, again, it gives us an opportunity to talk about the supply chain

It talks about having multiple vendors in the space. So in all of these efforts, whether it's short range, medium range, long range, we want multiple vendors participating because we know the industrial base needs to scale up

They need to ramp up, and that industrial base ramp up doesn't just happen at one vendor

It happens at a lot of suppliers. It happens at rare earth magnet suppliers

It happens really around the world. But what we really need to do is streamline those supply chains and get them to the point where we can mass produce these capabilities

The challenge is really going to be that we're going to be competing across the services

We sometimes different vendors will be competing with each other. So I was just reading some articles this morning on the way inbound about rare earth magnets

and how some of the manufacturers in the commercial industry are able to bring some of that in vertically integrated into their company

What I would offer is we're going to have to make some hard decisions on what we can help with in the Army

and there's some things that we can absolutely help with from a depot level or from a supply chain perspective

when it comes to our D-pass ratings and those kind of things. But what I would also offer is industry

is going to have to lean forward with us. If they haven't seen the targets in the budget

they can go in and look. And what I would offer is that there's an absolute demand signal coming from the Army

We've got clear requirements, clear guidance. We've got a rapid acquisition approach

And it's on the way. I did want to ask about airspace

You know, this is going to be a very complicated airspace that you're going to be dealing with when it comes to manned aviation, all the unmanned systems coming in

I know NextGen Command and Control, you'll be taking a look at that

4th ID is currently very busy scaling their NextGen C2 prototype in Colorado right now

And I believe that there's going to be an iteration that focuses on this. So talk about what you're going to be looking for and how you might be participating in this effort with the NGC-2 and the airspace deconfliction

Yeah, airspace is a critical aspect of this. And so, you know, when you look at the future operating environment, our gauge divisions, thousands of UASs that are going to be operating there

You know, that's your UASs, that's your launch defects. And then the volume of fires is going to be intense

And then you add on what the enemy is going to be doing against our forces

So how do you develop an airspace management system that allows you to see airspace not only inside an operation cell or inside of a ground vehicle, but also inside of a cockpit

So you can quickly decipher of what's flying, where can you put more UAS, where can you mass it, where can you put your man capability

And so in partnership with 25th ID and also 24th ID and 25th ID, we're developing software approaches for airspace management

And that's at the tactical level all the way up to the joint level. And so our ability to be able to share that data quickly, to see where capability is flying, where we need fires

and then more importantly, the reach goal in here is how do you have behaviors on the tactical edge

How do you have UASs out flying that can take a command from either an aircraft or an operation cell to be able to quickly deconflict

Typically right now, we see anywhere from 15 to 20 minutes to clear airspace, sometimes longer

That's unsatisfactory. We're going to be able to have to do that within minutes if we want to be able to, you know, be able to operate like I discussed before

Manned, unmanned, fires quickly to affect the enemy. And so as we work with NextGen C2 and 4th ID and 25th, we'll see over the next couple months some software applications that we're developing with industry partners that we'll bring into Project Convergence 6 later in the summer really to test this and get it out to the broader Army

Okay. Shifting gears to our legacy fleet, can you highlight how you are working to modernize some of these aircraft that will be flying for a very long time as well

You know, I actually think that there's, we're going to see on the showroom floor, a push to make certain aircraft fully unmanned, a full UAS version

what's the appetite for something like that in terms of adapting the legacy fleet to something

like not just optionally but like a full uas system so last year appreciate the question jen

so we talked about last summer and last fall we had laid in a foundation with the apache

to really look at its tail rotor its tailored drives we want to make sure that we were upgrading

parts like the oil cool generator to make sure that we had those sustainment items and really

the items that are going to give us more tail rotor authority just in a combat environment

We knew we were also looking at Black Hawk from a launch effects, an open system, and

an ITEP integration perspective. And then from Chinook, we were also looking at the Block

2 Chinook. We were looking at that payload capacity increase, and we were looking again

and open systems and integration of degraded visual environment. So all that said, the enduring fleet, if you will

has a future ahead of it It got a strong future when it comes to integrated modernized lethal capabilities And just to tie it back to launched effects we integrating a new launcher in both the Apache and the Blackhawk with an open system interface

And that launcher will bring on our launched effects, as well as be modular with JAGEM, with Hellfire, with APKWS

So it's got a lot of capability for growth, and it's got a lot of modularity that as we go forward

we know we're going to need with new technologies that rapidly come out on the battlefield

So, and from an autonomous requirements perspective, I'll hand it over to my requirements teammates

Yeah. I mean, three things, Jen. So one, you know, optionally piloted autonomy

So there's that aspect, but that's really tied to the sensors and capabilities we put on these aircraft

And so when we look at future experimentation, we've got an event coming up in February

There's three things we're doing there. One, David alluded to, we're going to have the first really launch off of an Apache and Blackhawk from a standpoint of launch defects

Integrating that is the network capabilities we want that's going to allow us to extend networks, share that data with NextGenC2

Those kits are already being developed with David's team that we're already going to federate on really all of our platforms

And then the last piece are the sensors. So adapting our aircraft, be it a Blackhawk or Apache or even with FLORA, those requirements we're already moving towards

So we can put those additional sensors and capabilities on those aircraft that then will drive, you know

the ability of the aircraft to either operate autonomously or optionally pilotage or just offload the burden of the aviator in the cockpit

And so all those three things are moving in parallel. And, you know, that's why, you know, we talked about FLORA acceleration

Acceleration is really get the prototype, but from a requirement standpoint, the quicker we move on Flora, the quicker we can adapt those capabilities on that system

is really a pathfinder for all of DOD. We don't talk a lot about our legacy fleet because we're talking so much about

I probably talk about UAS 60% of the time, Flora, the MB-75, 30% of the time

and then a couple other here and there. but you know to general phillips point like we are not walking away from our legacy fleet we're

going to have it for the certainly the rest of our lifetimes the soldiers that are coming in the army right now are going to be flying um the current fleet of aircraft and they're they're

going to be operating in a very uh dynamic environment i think there's a lot of discussion

about the survivability of rotorcraft in lisco fight and uh my my sort of response to that is

don't compare us to everybody else in the world and say, you know

because you saw a helicopter get shot down on YouTube that every helicopter is no longer relevant to the fight

In fact, I think it's ever more relevant. When you think about some of the tools that he talked about with how we plan our missions

you think about the training that we put into our aviators, you think about when we operate in a combined arms fashion and our ability to plan and execute a mission

bringing all of the rest of the Army's capabilities and, frankly, national capabilities to bear to be successful

yes, we're going to probably lead with unmanned things. Yes, MB-75 is going to be a game changer in terms of range and distance

But we're still going to be operating rotorcraft, you know, as far out as I can see

And I'm not terribly worried about, you know, whether or not it's going to be relevant on the battlefield

because I think, you know, the last 20 years, although counterinsurgency, counterterrorism

have proven that Army aviation is a fairly decisive capability when the United States goes to conflict

I think there's been quite a bit of recent hand-wringing over there will be less aviators in Army aviation

What do you say to those people out there that are concerned that you be cutting your aviators and going in favor of unmanned Yeah so this is the structure discussion uh with transformation you know that we have cut some structure uh on the certainly all of

our cav squadrons are starting to divest right now so they just started here in 26 so there are

some uh less requirements but what we're doing right now is trying to figure out how do we

optimize the formations that we do have. So we've been given some authority to overman our

formations. And so, you know, that'll help us. We've got some repair cycle floats that we're

going to be able to keep in our formations to keep our readiness up. So that there are probably

you know, we're going to lose a couple thousand spaces. And I think over time we can do that with

minimal impact to the individuals, but we probably are going to have to have some discussion with

folks about where they can best serve in the Army just based off the structure cuts that we've

taken. So this is really about, you know, I think the Army leadership has sort of seen that we were

overstructured in terms of what we needed, and so when you look at what all the priorities are

across the Army and a flat-lined budget, they've had to make some hard decisions, and that's where

they chose to assume some risk. All right. I'm going to give you a couple minutes to talk about flight school next

Where is that? Are you hitting any headwinds in terms of congressional support and anything like that as you move forward

You know, what are your benchmarks and how are you, what is the timeline in terms of

what you're hoping to hit? And what do you know for sure you want from flight school next now that you've had more

time to continue your evaluations and conduct studies? Thanks, Jen. And I know what I want

For sure what I want is a better trained aviator that we deliver to the Army. First and foremost, that's all I care about

I think I know we've done several business case yses that we can do it at a tremendous cost savings to the Army

that we can reapply to flight school or we can give it back to the Army for other priority efforts

Fundamentally what we're looking at is not only just a new aircraft, right

So going back to a single-engine trainer, but even a new business model

so using a commercially operated, commercially owned, the COCO model, as opposed to owning the aircraft outright for the Army

We're currently, so the commercial solutions opening, so we're going that route

Different methodology allows us to accelerate a little bit. The draft CSO is on SAM.gov right now

And it's given us a great opportunity with industry to have a conversation about what it is that we are seeking

So we put out certain criteria and requirements, and industry came back to us and said

are you sure that's what you're asking? Because if you only ask it this way, we're only going to be able to deliver you something

Do you want to open it up a little bit? And so we've actually had a great partnership with industry in developing the right contracting methodology

to make sure that what we're going to deliver back to the Army is what we want

I would like to see that. So, yes, I haven't seen the final language in whatever was conferenced

but we did owe a little bit of ysis back to the Congress

just to sort of articulate what it is that we're doing. Many of you know that we've run a pilot program

This was not a directed thing. This was something that we wanted to take a look at how the FAA trains a rotorcraft pilot

And so we put we're in our third and fourth class right now. Students going through a commercial basic helicopter qualification, private instrument ticketed in this case

We won't do that, but that's what they're doing. And what we seeing is they are I would say commensurate with what we do So what we do the good news is flight school is not wrong in terms of what we doing but they are a little more independent and they given a little bit more individualized requirements

So, you know, they have to do a little more of the legwork instead of us spoon feeding it to them

And I'm okay with that. I would like to see this. So I owe some feedback to some of the staffers who have asked us to come back and brief them

before we go final. I would like this on the street in 27 with a contract award by the end of the year

fundamentally to produce a better aviator for the Army. And we're going to do that through some of the critical tasks that we don't train right now

because we have dual engine trainers. We don't do what we call lost tail rotor effectiveness or stuck pedal, anti-torque maneuvers

We don't do auto rotations to the ground. So there's a generation of aviators that we're putting out in the Army right now that have never seen that

And then fundamentally, if we can save a little bit of money and reinvest it while giving aviators more time in flight school

so 62% more time, making them more experienced when we deliver them to the force, I think that's a good move on

Okay. We have like two minutes, so I think we have time for one question from the audience, Steve

All right. And there's a microphone right behind you if you want to. Steve Trumbull with Aviation Week, and thank you for doing it

It's been very informative. So I've been writing about collaborative combat aircraft and all the sister services

in several foreign militaries. Does the Army need something like that for MV-75 in the future or, you know

beyond what you're already doing with launch defects? I think it's broader than MV-75, but I think the answer is yes

Yeah, I think when you look at the role of launch defects and our ability to deliver mass with launch defects, I think there is a role

Like how do you pair another aircraft to bring in the amounts that we think we will need on the future battlefield to be able to operate inside of integrated air defense up against command and control systems

So a system that you could pair that with to be able to just bring additional mass out there as a capability

When you look at the distances that we're going to probably operate inside of Indo-Pacific, there may be a case for, you know, how do you, you know, grow a capability where you have both manned and unmanned from a distance and range-wise

But all that, yeah, we're in close dialogue with the other services as they build that out

I think tied to that is NextGenC2 because you're going to need the data fabric to be able to operate out extended ranges

So all the stuff that we need to be able to do that is being developed from a standpoint of network, launched effects, the autonomy aspect

The question is, you know, do we look at, you know, a specific vehicle we want to put that on to actually have that partnership

So all that's being looked at through our requirements and concepts, and we'll continue to develop that, you know, in partnership with the rest of the services

And I would offer that the technology is just exciting to watch, right? So the technologies that the other services are integrating, commercial industries integrating

we've got really tangible examples of how we can do this in a more affordable, more efficient way

And I think for some of those dangerous missions that are out there in the future, I think those autonomous unmanned capabilities and integrated with our existing capabilities

will absolutely make us more lethal and survivable. All right, so that brings us to the end of our discussion

A big thank you to the gentlemen here on stage. And, of course, thank you to Bell for supporting this important conversation here at AUSA

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